Stars and Fags

Missing.
And missing? Bad and good

After Tarn had gone, sometimes I would stand outside my back door. With a roll-your-own-cigarette. And a home made milk stout. Missing her and that.

Pondering. She is not to be seen again, held, listened to, care for us, watch the kids grow into the people we had hoped for, share life with.

It is not like divorce I suppose. No. I know.

Back then, now sometimes. Staring at the Southern Cross. Smoking. Sipping- not gulping.

Not being sorry for me, exactly- rather rationalising the not-really-felt-hurt to a future feeling of what-would-be-without-her. Sort of feeling/knowing[?]- I am gunna do this.

A lot of nights like that. Even in England, a few years later, looking at a different sky. Drunk, smoking, staring at a frosty fields and the stars, listening on the phone to the kids at mega-dollars per minute a million miles away. Missing.

And every time now even, when I step out into the night, there is that reminder of what it is/was/is to lose that close one, Tarn. Not of where I am.

Nothing special about that- I spose shallow could be a label. But I am here, with one child out the door, and the twins celebrating twelve years of being in my special presence, the other boy contemplating the complications of life before he leaves the nest.

There is/has/is been a weird idea/feeling that I was groomed- if anything should happen- Know This. [See recipes and other ponderings]. It seems my own parenting and then the shared life with Tarn prepared me to be able to get these dang kids out the door on their own two feet as thinking social individuals.

We did not really connect on each others passions as such, but shared or went with the flow anyway- a gallery show or sailing. We liked each other, the attitude, the affronts, "The Young Ones". The differences- as in country and city mouses that we were. A concert was a direct connect. The kids would have been a battlefield as they reached their teens, reflecting now. All round- not just Them, but between us as well I guess. [I do like gadgets and tv...]

There was supposed to be three kids. In reality there was four successful attempts that I know of, but between the first and second was a loss. While I was at work.

I sometimes wonder if the effects of the vanished child resounded within her for along. Certainly there was, but we did get through a couple of pills/drinks and a realisation- numbness and numbness=Not Good. Maybe there was the thought in her mind that "After a boy child, there Should Be A Girl Child". Tarn never did get to tell me more about the lost child- I think it was too traumatic. Tarn's mother never told me about what happened either- looks like it was just between me and Tarn.

Which was how I lost a probably okay new relationship a few years afterwards- it got to a required numbness and meant less judgement and feelings. Once a balance is regained, the new realisation of how life worked, at the time, meant losing that relationship- not needed? Could we leave it for later? I like to do things myself. Selfish and shallow?

And now looking back after the grieving period, there was a sense of anxiety- and a period of numbness after that.

A lot of, dunno, not excessive , but too much trying with "help". And the stars again. Calls to people not returned in kind. And that fact being revealed/exposed.

Grateful I am to the new friends made since.

Yesterday, I was in the mall, and met a couple from post-Tarn period that I had not seen for ages. Work had gone down in Bass Strait a few years ago. He had been given the choice of Siberia or the road. The road was just fine, "thanks for the loyalty". They were there for whatever, he just back from the Middle East, and they invited me/us to join them for a drink. I was so tempted, and said, "Maybe? Be back soon." The hunt was a failure [birthday shopping], so I returned to them at the coffee shoppe, and the coffee was a unjust reward. We chatted about life. Kids- of their two- one was at uni now like my #1Son and the other nearly finished secondary school. A mutual friend from our former company had died. Another was travelling the world with her partner and children- Paris, Moscow and other places- what a life. Hmm. Another friend was still in The Big Smoke struggling with their health. Contact renewed. Maybe a job prospect down the line- anything to do with new technology and being the beta tester!

I must visit people more. Selfish, shallow and unsocial-able. What else am I? Oh yeah, the point- missing Tarn and smoking. Having just put the scraps in the compost at midnight- Stars above set me off...

Doesn't help sleeping that I propose to toss out her belongings that were too hard to part with years ago. Boxes of letters. Clothes. Travel brochures and Fashion and stuff. I don't know if it is worth anything to her kids now. Me- looks like I am hoarding now. The house is full of unjunk. Do I need a fresh start somewhere else?

Bluudie ell, a ciggie woul' go doon jus so goot rat noo....